New Jersey court: a chicken could be a support animal, but six were not proven
New Jersey court: a chicken could be a support animal, but six were not proven
2026-09-15 · New Jersey · Courts
A New Jersey appellate panel has held that a chicken can in principle be an emotional support animal, and that six of them were not shown to be necessary.
Amherst Farms Homeowners Association, Inc. v. D.M. and L.S., Docket A-4057-23, was submitted December 9, 2025 and decided December 19, 2025 before Judges Gilson and Perez Friscia. It is unpublished and therefore not precedential under R. 1:36-3 — but it is the first New Jersey appellate application of the Supreme Court's 2024 Players Place II framework to a non-dog animal.1
The facts
Amherst Farms is the homeowners association for a planned community of 184 homes in Mickleton, on half-acre lots with shared amenities. The owners kept six backyard chickens and asserted them as emotional support animals for L.S., who has PTSD. The association sued for declaratory judgment and an injunction; the owners counterclaimed under the federal Fair Housing Act and the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination, along with fraud, intentional infliction of emotional distress and malicious use of process.
The Chancery Division in Gloucester County granted the association summary judgment on July 16, 2024 and dismissed the counterclaims. The Appellate Division affirmed.
The part that is easy to over-read
The panel did not hold that chickens cannot be support animals. It expressly declined to: the court said it did "not foreclose that a chicken could qualify as an ESA," and acknowledged that support animals "provide a wide range of assistance to people with disabilities."
The decision turns on evidence, not species.
The "unique animal" burden
The framework the panel applied distinguishes "animals commonly kept in households" from "[u]nique animals," and places barnyard and other non-domesticated animals in the second category. For a unique animal, "the requestor ha[d] the substantial burden of demonstrating a disability-related therapeutic need for the specific animal or the specific type of animal."
The owners accepted that burden. What they had to show, the panel said, was "how each unique chicken is necessary for her equal enjoyment of the residence." L.S.'s own assertion that she needed all six "to therapeutically ameliorate her disability is insufficient," because "the therapeutic disability related issues are not within common knowledge."
Why the medical letters failed
This is the operative holding, and it is about documentation quality rather than about animals at all.
Two health-care professionals wrote letters. The panel found "no error in the court's determination that their letter opinions were 'net opinions' because 'the "whys" and the "wherefores" [we]re not sufficiently nor adequately addressed.'"
One doctor's six-sentence letter failed to explain how the six chickens "provide [L.S.] with unique and individual emotional support and significant relief." The other's statement that the relationship with the poultry "initially made a substantial decrease in stress levels, reduced panic and increased management of anxiety" had "no foundational support and analysis."
The contrast with Players Place II is drawn explicitly: there, the homeowner "proffered multiple experts who had each observed the homeowner, reviewed the mental health history records and diagnoses, and provided opinions specific to the homeowner's need for the requested ESA."
What this means for a New Jersey board — at the category level
The panel affirmed "on the narrow ground" that the owners failed to meet their burden, so the association never had to show the accommodation was unreasonable. The burden never shifted.
That sequencing is the practical lesson. Where documentation for a unique animal is conclusory, a board is not required to prove hardship, cost, or disruption. Where documentation is individualised and clinically reasoned, the burden moves and the analysis becomes much harder for the association.
A board receiving an accommodation request for an unusual animal should therefore be asking for documentation that connects the specific animal to the specific limitation — not refusing on the basis of species, and not demanding a diagnosis. The panel also noted that the business judgment rule "applies 'to common interest communities.'"
The footnote worth noticing
The opinion records that the federal guidance both sides had been working from was withdrawn on September 17, 2025. The panel applied it anyway, because both parties had relied on it when the request was made.
That is a narrow, fairness-driven choice tied to these facts. It is not a holding that the guidance survives, and a board treating the 2020 document as current policy in a 2026 request is on notice that a court may not.
New Jersey's own framework is unaffected either way. The Law Against Discrimination independently requires reasonable accommodation in housing, it "defines 'disability' more broadly than the FHA," and it is enforced by the Division on Civil Rights. Federal guidance changing does not narrow New Jersey's statute.
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